Inverness, Clachnaharry, Clachnaharry Road, Caledonian Canal, Clachnaharry Lock, Canal Workshops View from the south-east showing the road side frontage of the Canal Workshops. The hand crane and Cla ...

Description Inverness, Clachnaharry, Clachnaharry Road, Caledonian Canal, Clachnaharry Lock, Canal Workshops View from the south-east showing the road side frontage of the Canal Workshops. The hand crane and Clachnaharry Lock are visible on the extreme right Digital image of D 64070 Cn.

Date 30/3/1999

Collection Records of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS), Edinbu

Catalogue Number SC 799568

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of D 64070 CN

Scope and Content Canal Workshops, Clachnaharry Lock, Caledonian Canal, Inverness, Highland, from south-east This shows the canal workshops which were probably built around 1807 and rebuilt around 1850. The main block (left) has a central louvred ventilator with a bellcote on the right and a loft entrance door on the left. This door would give easy access to store areas for materials unloaded off trucks on the road. The building with the hipped roof (centre) was originally the blacksmith's shop and the two-legged hand crane (far right) was probably used in conjunction with a now-demolished sawmill. Carpenters and blacksmiths would have been employed in the workshops to build and carry out repairs on lock gates and other structures along the canal. A boat called 'gatelifter' which contained fitting apparatus would be used to transport lock gates made in this building. The Caledonian Canal was designed by Thomas Telford (1757-1834) and built between 1803 and 1822 at a cost of £840,000. It was the first example of a transport network funded by the government in Great Britain. The 96.5km-long canal provides a route for boats travelling between the North Sea and Atlantic Ocean as it runs from the Beauly Firth at Clachnaharry, Inverness, to Loch Linnhe at Corpach. Only 35.4km of this length is man-made while the other 61km runs through four lochs: Loch Dochfour, Loch Ness, Loch Oich and Loch Lochy. Unfortunately at 4.2m deep the canal was too small for most sea-going ships which led to it being altered and deepened between 1844 and 1847. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/799568

File Format (TIF) Tagged Image File Format bitmap